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An stream so low you barely got your feet wet separated a community for over four decades of time. By an accident of topography, the fifty residents of Mödlareuth, a small village bordered by evergreen groves, pastures and breathtaking scenery, found themselves at the core of the cold war. They had the misfortune to cross the Bavarian region, in West Germany, and Thuringia in the Eastern part, a frontier that was marked first by a enclosure and then by a wall. United States military personnel dubbed it Mini Berlin.

Commemorating History

Several months after their own wall was torn down, and prior to their nation had reunified in 1990, a assembly of villagers started commemorating their past. The effort is soon to come to fruition: on 9 November, the 36th commemoration of the collapse of the Wall in Berlin, the Deutsch-Deutsches Museum Mödlareuth will open. It was formally launched by the head of state, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, in the first part of October, but the show was not completely ready. Telling the residents who endured the old days, Steinmeier said: “You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which ripped families apart and turned neighbours into foreigners.”

“You were bystanders of an inhuman split, which tore relatives into pieces and turned neighbors into foreigners.”

Bygone Background

Right from its establishment in 1810, the village cut across the Bavarian Kingdom and the Principality of Reuss, a royal family best known for assigning all its male members the name Heinrich and numbering them sequentially by birth order. As Steinmeier related to the gathering, the quirk was never an obstacle in the manner of the inhabitants drinking in the identical inn, going to the identical place of worship and placing their young ones to the identical educational institution.

Post-War Division

Then came the second world war. The moment they arrived, the Russians installed timber poles by the stream. For a annual period they occupied the entire village, setting up their command in a building on the Bavarian side, decorating it with a portrait of Stalin and a communist symbol. The American soldiers urged them to retreat back over the creek. For a period, locals could still hop over, though as limitations increased they were required to show ID, despite the fact that each person understood who they were, and to return at night.

Increase of Frontier Measures

Then, in 1952, came wire fencing and the official closing of the frontier. In 1966, as in Berlin five years earlier, a barrier was built, with landmines, anti-tank obstacles and watchtowers. The locals could still see each other by ascending elevations, but on the east side waving and yelling were prohibited. One woman was put on a Stasi surveillance list for replying “back at you” to a Bavarian resident who greeted her “happy new year”.

Museum Development

I was told stories like these tales by Robert Lebegern, the head of the institution, who has dedicated a large part of his working life creating it. Locals were consulted early on about how how long a section structure they wanted to keep. They opted for a section on the western perimeter, near where a local resident was able to get away in the darkest hours with a climbing device, following which the frontier was significantly reinforced.

Conserved Structures

A pair of observation towers are conserved together with a series of exhibits illustrating the most significant events in the hamlet’s history. As we move, Robert Lebegern lists the rules: nobody could approach 5km of the border. Agricultural workers needed specific authorization to tend to their produce; the partner could use the combine harvester but under no circumstances the two, lest they tried to escape. Military personnel kept guard.

Broader Background

The boundary between Western Germany and the GDR ran 1,400km, from the Baltic coast in the north to this location in the south. Berlin is recalled and honored the most, but more than two times more people (well over 300) lost their lives attempting to cross it in countryside regions than in the urban center. the director informs me that almost all of attempts to flee failed.

Village Daily Living

The greater part of Mödlareuth’s villagers were rural laborers or craftsmen, who accommodated to residing in the uncertain territory between two belief systems by avoiding attention and tending to their farms. They neither endorsed the communist regime nor fought it, Lebegern explains.

Tourism

For tourists, however, the settlement became a type of pilgrimage. About 15k came to see every year, viewing tools in their hands, to gawp – and then swiftly leave. In 1983, the US president, George Bush, was shown around by the German defense official.

25 years after reunification, Tannbach, a broadcast production about a fictional hamlet similar to Mödlareuth, resulted in fresh curiosity.

Current Developments

The launch of the new museum – with a coffee shop, boutique, cinema room and big vehicle area – is probable to